


What's One More Night?

by RavensRedShadow



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-24
Updated: 2013-03-24
Packaged: 2017-12-06 08:30:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/733625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RavensRedShadow/pseuds/RavensRedShadow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes I’m afraid to sleep because even my good dreams burn. Even in my deepest sleep I know the visions aren't real.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What's One More Night?

Sometimes, on nights like tonight when I can’t sleep, I lay awake in my bed feeling the students dream. I never focus enough on one mind to read it, to encroach on their private hopes, but I catch glimpses of smiling faces, happy feelings. These children, who have had to grow up way too fast, can escape in their dreams. I’ve been able to create a place where they feel safe enough to dream. The thought makes me smile.

It is nights like this that make me feel like everything could be okay. Because if I can keep a child safe, take away their nightmares, I must be doing something right.

I prefer the children’s dreams to my own. Sometimes I’m afraid to sleep because even my good dreams burn. I can’t dream like them, no matter how much I want to. Even in my deepest sleep I know the visions aren't real. So when I hear my sister’s laugh and see the sparkle in her yellow eyes it doesn’t make me happy, it makes me want to cry. When I see a young girl with dragon fly wings flitting around I can’t be amazed. And when I feel his lips against my own I can’t give into the feeling without feeling empty. Numb.

In my dreams I can walk. I can wiggle my toes in the sand; I can run with Hank, I can swim with Raven. But in real life I hate the sand; it just reminds me of a burning in my back and goodbyes. Hank no longer goes for runs; he just stays inside his lab, locked away for days. And Raven…well she might as well have died on that beach. No one living answers to that name now. Only Mystique is left.

It’s nights like this that I let myself close my eyes and think about him. I give in and pull up old memories to remember a time when he laughed, when he smiled. I remember his mind, clear and enchanting. Now, behind that helmet, it’s like an emptiness that I can never reach. Never hope to fill.

I try not to remember the bad times but they bleed through anyway. The first time I tried to reason with him across battle line. The first time I saw my sister coldly attack Hank, a boy not too long ago she had been mooning over like a school-girl with a crush. That was the first time I realized that things could never go back to what they were. No matter how much I screamed my words would never reach them. Maybe that was the day I truly gave up that last shred of hope I’d clung to so desperately.

Sometimes I wish I had died on that beach. I wish I had died on the moment the bullet entered my back. Then I could have been spared the even worse pain of having to look him in the eyes and watch the man I knew die.

But I have the children now and they give me the hope I need to carry on. When I’m watching their faces light up I am assured that I did the right thing, no matter how much pain it took to get here. When I feel their dreams I know that I will protect them until I can’t anymore. I know that I would give up anything to make sure they are safe. And they are safe, for now, and I can breathe easy knowing that.

So now I’ll close my eyes and pray that I won’t dream of chess games and satellite dishes. Maybe I can forget a man I once thought I could save. But even my sleep addled mind knows this is just another lie I tell myself. Because every time I finally close my eyes it’s his face I see staring right back at me. And this time it’s his hand outstretched towards me. _You're not alone._ But I am.

One night I won’t take his hand. But not tonight. Just this one last night I need him. _Another lie_ , my mind whispers. That’s okay though. What’s one more lie? What’s one more night?

**Author's Note:**

> My first attempt at writing X-Men First Class. Please let me know what you think.


End file.
